Hope
by Alhendra
Summary: Sirius is waiting to explain the truth to the only person he knows will believe it.


**Hope**

Disclaimer: All characters belong to Rowling and her imagination.

* * *

It took a long, long time for Remus to visit. At first, I thought it must be beaurocracy, miles of red tape slowing him down. As the days passed, long and miserable, and I had torn my insides to shreds over and over again over James and Lily's death, I started to despair. Would Remus _never_ come? I needed to warn him…Peter was still at large. No one else believed me, and with the groundwork that that rat had laid, it was not surprising.

I could still hardly believe it. My perfect plan to ensure that James was safe had crumbled to nothing. Even Dumbledore, renowned for his faith in humanity, couldn't believe me this time. The perfect trap had been laid, and I fitted the criminal perfectly. In a world were a mother could strangle her babe with her own hands, being best friends meant less than nothing. A best friend knew you inside out…a best friend could betray you more intimately than your arch enemy could.

I waited, and waited. I knew he would visit. Remus most certainly would. If there was anyone, anyone who would believe in me, it was him. Remus knew me, knew me better than I knew myself. We had all been mistaken in Peter, but he would realize the truth of what I said. Such a cowardly creature had been easily tempted into darkness, and I had only myself to blame for not realizing it beforehand.

A week passed, soon two. Weeks turned into months, and months into an endless stream of misery. Remus…was not going to visit? My werewolf, the one person who knew me inside out and upside down…had forsaken me?

I had long given up hope, having lost count of the days, when footsteps stopped in front of my cell. Dementors came and went, I was as used to them as one could be in this place, but they had no need of visiting us. I raised my head slowly.

The only friend left that I had stood there, looking at me silently through the bars. He had aged at least five years since the last time I'd seen him, which had been a day or two before my capture. Time had become hazy, indistinct. Faces, memories were fading. The only faces I still knew clearly were Remus', James', Lily's and Peter's. James and Lily – I kept seeing in front of me, accusing. I had left their son without parents, without love. Remus…I clung to his image desperately. With nothing left, it was the only thing I had to cling to. And Peter…him I would never ever forget. His blood would be on my hands before my life was over. Azkaban would not be the end of me. Somehow Remus and I would expose the truth to the world.

"Remus!" I was on my feet and gripping the bars of my cell without even being conscious of moving. "Remus, thank god…I…thought you weren't coming…I've been wanting to see you for so long…!" My eyes ran over his face, his hair, his shabby clothes, every detail a wonder, and suddenly a feeling which I had almost forgotten overtook me. Love…I loved this werewolf, a love different from that which I'd held for James and Lily, and for the traitor when I still hadn't seen his true colours. The admission slipped out of me before I could control it…he might disappear before I had a chance to tell him. "Remus, I love you Remus, god I…"

"Why did you kill them?" It was barely a whisper, and yet it brought me to a halt better than anything else could. For a moment I just stared at him, knowing nothing but the blood rushing in my ears, the look in his eyes, the coldness of the metal under my hands and the steadying feel of ground pushing against my feet, and a dizzying, crushing, numbing disappointment weighing on my soul.

"Why did I…" my voice was barely a whisper, and I released the metal bars slowly. "Why did I kill them?" It was no joke…he kept looking at me, waiting for an answer.

And I turned away. He didn't believe me. My Remus…didn't believe me. Even _he_ thought I had betrayed James and Lily. I walked to the other side of my cell and sat down slowly, turning to look at him again when I was sitting.

What use would telling him be? I knew what would happen next, I was a fool not to think of it before. His eyes would fill with angry tears, and he would curse me for being such a traitor, for trying to besmirch a dead friend's name to save my own, curse me for being so wretched that I betrayed both my best friend and Peter.

My revenge on Peter would have to be undertaken alone. Simply by me, myself and I. My beloved Remus…knew nothing of me. So I shuttered my eyes and my heart, and gave him a smile I knew would haunt him for the rest of his life.

"…because I'm Sirius Black."


End file.
